[X] My Assistant

[Kamaitachi]

Brushing an errant lock of hair from his face, Kanoa Kaipo continued scanning the screen of his laptop. He'd just received an e-mail from Lennox, detailing another mission.

"Aqua Outpost? Sector...wha?" Kanoa mused aloud, staring at the screen. "Assigned a task force...should be arriving at 15:00 to begin mission..."

He scrolled down a bit to the attachment, where Lennox, his commanding officer, had thoughtfully paperclipped several dossiers. Clicking on the first,

"Luisengardt, Emma. Alias: Swallow"

Snarking out loud, Kanoa startled the pokemon on the ceiling. An angry looking Spinarak, named Theridon, clacked angrily at him for the loud, surprising noise. Looking up, Kanoa gave the arachnid a dopey grin.

"Her callsign is 'Swallow'. What a whore, am I right, Theridon?"

The Spinarak seemed largely uninterested in Kanoa's juvenile humour, and made his way over to the corner of a ceiling where he resumed his pout. Atop the fridge in the kitchen, a Weedle named Apis stood guard over an Caterpie named Aporia, bristling his head horn at an encroaching Skorupi.

The first three bug pokemon belonged to Kanoa's 'roommate', Spider. Kanoa had found the boy in an abandoned Magma warehouse, and had essentially adopted him. He couldn't exactly send the kid to school, especially on his wage, but he let the socially challenged teenager stay in his apartment free fo charge. Spider had slowly began to figure out things like television and refrigerators, but mostly kept to his own. At current, he was curled up, napping on Kanoa's bed while hs pokemon argued vehemently with Kanoa's Skorupi, Darkslide.

Kanoa, ignoring the ruckus in his kitchen unit, continued to peruse the few dossiers sent to him.

"Luisengardt, Emma. Swallow. Perez, Gabi. Firebug. Quince, Peter. Mustard...Mustard? Huh. Yardow, Eric. Squire. Swallow, Firebug, Mustard, Squire."

Kanoa made a face, as if deep in thought as he pondered over the names. After several moments of holding said thoughtful face, he realized that he wasn't actually applying any thought to decrypting any sort of pattern.

Figuring he could leave that to his 'task force', he rose out of his chair, stretching out in his boxer-clad glory. In the comfort of his own apartment, Kanoa preferred existing with as little clothing as possible. Now that Spider was around, he had to at least cover up his unmentionables.

Checking the clock, it was rather close to the 3pm meeting time that the e-mail described. At the very least, it was a sure sign that he needed to start checking his e-mail earlier in the day. After popping some leftovers in the microwave, he moved over to his closet and began shuffling around for an outfit.

As the microwave chimed, indicating that his half-a-burrito had finished, he had slipped on a grey tank top with a black star, and a pair of jeans, just a little baggy around his legs. He slipped on a few leather belt-looking wristbands and a matching choker collar...because it looked cool.

Reaching into the microwave, he recoiled immediately as his meal-to-be proved to be rather hot. Pulling a sad, puppy face at the microwave, he sucked on his burned fingers, as if to make the microwave feel guilty for its most heinous crime. Seeing that the appliance was unrepentant, Kanoa flicked it off and grabbed the cooling Burrito, taking a defiant bite. The insides hadn't quite heated up, but it was still rather tasty bite. With that, Kanoa plopped back down in his chair, waiting for his "Task Force" to arrive.

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

Abraham West, in his own mind, was an exception. He was a member of Team Magma, but not by choice. He was there to pay off a debt. He didn't have a sense of accomplishment when completing missions. He didn't enjoy being there. It was simply to pay off a debt.

Don't tell him, though, but he was fooling himself. It was in his nature to run. That's why he was in Noverus in the first place. He got caught in the middle of a scam back in Mauville, and ran here. He got caught again, but this time, he didn't run. He would never admit it, but he liked it here. He liked not knowing what missions he'd get. The thought of running had barely crossed his mind.

With the exception of mornings. When his cell phone rang in the mornings, as it so tended to do, he groaned and cursed. This was not the schedule he desired. It rang a few times, penetrating his dreams, confusing him to no end. Then, the sounds of Tartarus infiltrated, evidently annoyed at the endless ringing. "Elekid!"

He opened his eyes and sighed, reaching for the phone and pulling it to his year while accepting the call. He didn't even check to see who it was. "West." was all he said.

"Morning, West. This is Agent Lennox."

"Yeah," Abraham nodded. "What's up?"

"I just sent Rascal a mission, and I think I want you to join him."

"Who?"

"Kaipo."

"Right, him." Abraham nodded, somewhat relieved. He and Kanoa were two very different people who somehow got along exceptionally well.

"I'm giving you guys a team, though they'll be working directly under Rascal. I want you to be there, not under or over him, but alongside. You two work well together, and at this point, even though he outranks you, I believe you are an effective team. I want you making strategic decisions, and him making tactical ones. Do you need me to clarify the difference?"

"No, I'm all set."

"Good. I'm sending him an email right now, informing him of your role. The recruits will be at his apartment in one hour, and I'd like for you to be there before them."

"Fair enough," Abraham said. "Anything else? I guess 'Rascal' will explain the mission?"

"Yeah."

"Alright,"

"Oh, one more thing."

"Mhm?"

"You need a codename."

"Do I, really?" Abraham sighed. "Seems so unnecessary."

"Come up with one on your way to Rascal's, and inform him of it. I want his team to refer to you by that name. I don't want them to even know what your real name is."

"Alright, I'll take care of it."

And so, he got ready. Took a shower, brushed his teeth, shaved his face, combed his hair. Then, he got dressed in a back button down shirt with a silver tie. He tucked it into his black pants and looked at himself in the mirror for a good minute before nodding. He walked back into his room and looked over to Gaia, his recently evolved Piloswine. "How do I look?"

She seemed to smile and awkwardly moved towards him. She was still getting used to her big body. He patted her on the head and looked over to Tartarus, the Elekid, rotating his arms and looking at his trainer expectantly. He was ready to go. Chaos, his Shellder, was sitting on his bed watching him, evidently also ready to go.

"I guess we're all ready," he said, pulling out their pokeballs from his dresser. He called them all in, including Gaia (which he decided to do since she was so large and more threatening in appearance now, so he didn't feel comfortable walking around town with her).

He began his walk towards Kanoa's apartment, not wanting to take a cab. He didn't get to exercise very often with the exception of his walks around town, so he saw this as an opportunity more than anything. He might not get there before the recruits, but he didn't think Kanoa would tattle.

When he got there, he knocked fairly casually and stood back so he could be seen.

[Kamaitachi]

Kanoa's eye flicked over to the corner of his computer screen, where a small envelope had appeared in the corner. Rolling his eyes at the thought of another e-mail from Lennox (or one of those ads that told him that he needed to enlarge parts of him that he was perfectly happy with), he rolled the mouse over and clicked.

Making a noise of mock surprise, Kanoa dully glazed over the e-mail until he came across something he actually felt excited over.

"BROHAM!" He cheered, pumping his fist in the air from dramatic emphasis, though it did nothing but to illicit some annoyed clacking from a certain Spinarak sulking in the corner.

As he started to settle back in, feeling much better about the looming mission, a swift knock came at the door. Lurching out of his chair, Kanoa quickly regained his balanced and almost hopskipped across the room, flinging the door wide.

A grin plastered itself on his face, expecting to see Abraham West on the other side of the threshold, but instead, he saw three young faces peering at him. A few gears slowly kicked into place as Kanoa realized that the other operatives were just about his age.

"You must be the recruits." The lanky teen couldn't help but sigh a little. Not only were these kids not the tall, dark and handsome Abraham West, but they were in fact, greenhorns like himself. He remembered that he'd been sent on some crappy missions when he first started, and he'd never been assigned to a higher up to date. However, perhaps these kids lucked out; Kanoa was a pretty damn cool boss. Hopefully. "Come in." He ushered them in, using the half-eaten burrito in his hand as a sort of conducting baton. The trio stood around in Kanoa's apartment, looking around in fascination at the single studio flat, while a child slept on the bed, and a few bug pokemon noisily scuttled around the room.

"So...you're Agent Rascal?" one ventured to pipe up. This girl had wavy, sandy blonde hair, and far too serious brown eyes. ("Dye Job." Kanoa muttered inwardly, referring to her hair.)

"Yep." Kanoa grinned, plopping back into his chair, nibbling idly from the burrito.

"How old are you?" the second asked, who turned out to be a guy probably a little older than Kanoa, with a crew cut and squinty eyes. The "leader" of the task force couldn't even make out his eye colour due to the squintiness of it, so he figured he'd have to check the dossier later to be sure...if it even really mattered.

"Old enough." Kanoa shrugged, still grinning. "Age is nothing. I'm just too cool to be an underling."

"Yeah, I can tell!" the third spoke. Kanoa half expected such a sentence to come off practically drooling sarcasm, but it seemed rather earnest, and came from another girl, probably the youngest of the lot at or about fifteen, with a black bob-cut and rather twinkly looking brown eyes.

"Fifty points to Bob-Cut." Kanoa pointed her out with his burrito, almost as if he were mock knighting her. "WHat're your names?"

"Kat." "Pike." "Tanya."

The names flew out in rapid succession, but Kanoa found that as soon as they entered his ears, the names immediately spilled out the other into a jumbled heap on the floor.

"Right. Sandy. Shortstuff. Bobcat." He repeated offhandedly, unsure exactly as to how to go about remembering such complicated names.

"Oh...are those our codenames?" The squinty eyed guy cocked an eyebrow, looking a bit confused.

"Sure, for this mission...what not?" Kanoa shrugged, "We're just waiting on one more person for now, so go ahead and make yourselves at home, then I'll give a briefing or something, right?"

At that moment, another knock rapped smartly on the door. Kanoa almost fell out of his chair as he made a mad scramble for the door, anxious to be free from the awkwardness of introductions to his mooks.

Swinging the door open revealed a rather dressed down, but still fancy looking Abraham West.

"Boy, am I glad to see you." Turning to the group as he ushered Abraham into his apartment. "A man who needs no introduction...but he's gonna introduce himself anyways. Without further ado..." Kanoa shot Abraham a glance from the corner of his eye. Hopefully, Abraham had chosen a cool codename that was easy to remember.

Something like Minty-Fresh, or Cool-Killah. Those were wicked names, and Abraham had the opportunity to pick one for himself.

Don't waste this chance!!! Kanoa silently begged Abraham Pick an awesome, awesome name!

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

"Hey," Abraham nodded as he walked into Kanoa's place. "I'm Prometheus." He was happy with it. There was meaning which fit with his pokemon as well as himself. He was Prometheus. "I don't know if Rascal has told you, but I'm not your boss, and he's not mine. I'm here to help him make strategic decisions, and he's here to lead you. That said, if I do tell you to do something, you should do it. Things tend to work better that way. I'm sure Rascal can back me up on that."

He radiated confidence, but it was somewhat deserved. Since he joined Team Magma, he hadn't yet lost a mission, and a lot of this was a direct result of a clutch decision which he, himself, made. Moreover, Kanoa wasn't the type of boss or leader to take full credit for his subordinates' work, which is certainly a rare attribute and, unfortunately, doomed him to remain in the low end of middle management. What this meant for Abraham is that the higher ups knew he was competent.

He looked around the room, sizing up Kanoa'z Kidz. Like his partner, the first one he noticed was the blonde. She stood out, after all, and that was clearly her intent. Having a smokin' hot eighteen year old (one could only hope) girl on board would certainly be beneficial. It just opens up a lot of doors that Kanoa, Abraham and Ares could not access. Also, he wanted to sleep with her.

He then noticed the younger looking girl and noted that there sure were a lot of kids in Team Magma, then immediately directed his attention to the guy, who appeared to think he was the shit. This one wasn't going to be ordered around easily, least of all by Kanoa, who lacked the confidence of a great leader. Still, he would fall in line once a battle occurred and it became clear that Kanoa knew how to handle himself in the heat of the moment. Well, he was getting better at least, and was certainly better than this recruit. Hopefully.

"So, Lennox didn't give me a briefing," Abraham said, turning again to Kanoa. "Hope you don't have to repeat yourself."

[Kamaitachi]

"You're just in time." Kanoa grinned as he closed the door behind his favourite partner.

"So...it's like this. There's an Aqua safehouse somewhere near here, where they've got agents hiding out. Our job is to find it, and shut it down.

According to our intel, there are at least four people there whom we can track back to this base."

He pulled up their faces on the computer screen, showing the dossiers for the four Aqua Agents.

"So we have Emma Luisengardt, codename: Swallow. She 'works' down over at the Laundromat at the end of the street, like four blocks away. One of us needs to scope her out. Since I live here, I'll go bring some laundry over and see what I can find.

Gabi Perez, or Firebug, is a personal trainer over at the gym. I think Bro-metheus over here should hit her up." Kanoa winked roguishly at Abraham, figuring he'd just earned some bonus points by handing a hot girl over to Abraham to scout out.

"Peter Quince, codename: Mustard, is one of the Librarians over at the Alaka-Library, so let's have you go scope him out" He pointed a finger directly in the face of the squinty eyed guy. "You look kinda dorky, so you'd fit in at a library, right? Me?"

He then pulled up the final dossier. "And lastly, Eric Yardow, or Squire. Let's have Sandy go tail him. He's one of the interns over at the Pokelite Law-firm, so he'll probably be running in and out of the building running errands for lawyers, right?

So Bobcat McBobbingston, you get to hold down the fort here and pass information back and forth. You're going to be our little operator. Keep us informed of everything, no matter how trivial. These guys are undercover like us; so we've got to tail them without giving ourselves away.

So that's part one of our mission, right? Once we find the base, then we bust in gangbusters style and wreck shit up. Gottit?"

He reached down under his desk and pulled out a briefcase, which he opened up. Inside were the fancy bluetooth communicators he'd received from HQ. "Here, put these on, and keep in touch with each other. It's important that we talk to one another."

He stood from the chair, offering it to the youngest girl, Tanya. Really, like Ares, Kanoa had no desire to send her into a combat zone, so at least she could work from the relative safety of Kanoa's apartment.

"Theridon, Apis, Aporia, be nice to her while she's here." He looked over at Spider. "If he wakes up, just point to yourself and say 'Kanoa's friend', and he'll understand."

Kanoa placed his hands on his hips, feeling all leader-ly and whatnot. He'd just given what he considered a good briefing, and was ready to head out into the actual field-work.

"As for tailing your marks, just do what you think is best."

If he'd missed anything, he was sure Abraham would cover and pull him back in, but right now, his excitement for the new mission was taking over. He'd grab his laundry once they were all out, then he'd head to the laundromat. Sandy (Kat) and Shortstuff (Pike), looked pretty unsure, considering that they were complete newbies to Magma, but they'd probably been assigned because Aqua had no intel on them, Kanoa figured. However, he needed to galvanize the troupe into action now.

So he opened the door to his apartment:

"Go Team!" He grinned wildly, figuring this to be a great way to start them off.

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

Abraham figured Kanoa wouldn't mention the need to be inconspicuous. It wasn't really his style. But when Abraham was working a mission, his first and foremost thought had always been success. This success had nothing to do with pride for his faction or with a need to be a hero. His life was on the line at every moment of his membership of Team Magma, and failure was simply not the greatest option. Trying to be a hero, he found, is the perfect way to fail.

"Avoid combat," Abraham added. He got the notion that Kanoa wanted his input, so he gave it. Working with such a large team, and when his success was dependent on them, he was going to give it anyway. "If you can. Regardless of whether or not you think you can win, combat is always risky, and we're not in the business of uncertainty. Save the combat for when we're all together and we have an actual strategy, so we can mitigate as much risk as possible."

So they split up. It seemed he was finally able to complete at least a part of a mission on his own, which was preferred. He had great confidence in his abilities, and lately, in his pokemons' abilities as well. So he headed over to the nearby gym (after asking Kanoa for some quick directions since he was in a different area than where he lived). In the world of pokemon, a gym is typically where where people train their pokemon. But since Kanoa said "personal trainer" he figured this was the type of gym where people train themselves.

Both were true here. He walked in and was immediately impressed with the establishment. There were machines for people to work out and there were areas where trainers were battling one another to strengthen their pokemon. He did mention something about not engaging in combat, but this didn't really count as combat, did it? Hell, maybe it would give him a chance to find this Firebug. He had to blend, after all, and he did walk into the gym with pokeballs on his belt. Clearly he was here to train pokemon.

"Hi!" said a young looking brunette at the front desk as Abraham walked in. She was smiling really big, to the point where it looked forced. It was her job to be welcoming, after all, so he didn't blame her. He wondered if this was Firebug. It was possible - This was more or less a front job after all, meaning she was here for her mission, not for the 10 dollars an hour. That was probably reason enough to take the job pretty seriously. Regardless, there was a pretty easy way to find out.

"Hey there," Abraham said, smiling and nodding.

"You're a little dressed up," she noted. "I take it you're not here to work out?"

"You got me," he said. "I noticed you guys have pokemon training."

"Sure do," she smiled. "I gotta warn you, though, this isn't like, a pokemon gym. Trainers come here for battles, but we don't give out badges."

"That's cool," Abraham smiled. "I was kinda looking for a place to train my pokemon more or less. The gym by my place doesn't allow pokemon outside of their balls, so I always felt bad working out without 'em. I heard you guys offer both, so I thought I'd check it out."

"Awesome!" the girl grinned. "Well, if you wanna try it out for the day, you're welcome to do that. I'll just need you to fill out some forms and show some ID."

"Just for a try?"

"Well, yeah," she shrugged. "It's policy, you know. People could just do a free trial every day otherwise, right?"

"Right, yeah," he nodded. "Yeah, you're right."

This was a problem. His own team didn't even know his real name, and here he was about to give it to a complete stranger who very well could be an undercover Aqua operative. On top of them, even if this wasn't Firebug, she was going to input his name into their system. He needed to get some fake ID or something. He put his right hand on his back pocket and felt his wallet.

"You know what?" he began. "I, ah," he shook his head. "I think I might've left my wallet in my office."

"Oh," the girl looked disappointed.

"Yeah," Abraham just shook his head. "I'm really sorry for wasting your time, um- I didn't get your name."

"Chelsea," she said.

"Chelsea," he smiled. This was not his Firebug. "Well, I don't really have time to come back, so maybe I'll try again tomorrow?"

"You know what?" Chelsea said. "Go ahead. You're only gonna be here for, what? Thirty minutes?"

"Tops."

"Yeah, get on back there. We have some good people working here, and our customers are great too. Introduce yourself, have a battle or two."

"Yeah? You don't mind?"

"Sure!" she said. "Could I just get your name, though? I'll be here tomorrow if you wanna come sign up!"

"Sure," he nodded, holding out his hand. "I'm Rick. Nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you. Now, head on back. Our pokemon moderators today are Jake, Tim and Gabi." Gabi - Firebug.

"Pokemon moderators?"

"You know, they make sure the battles don't get out of control."

"Ah, okay. Well, thanks again Chelsea. I'll keep our deal on the down-low."

"I surely appreciate it."

[Kamaitachi]

Once he'd ushered everyone out of his apartment, Kanoa flipped a thumbs up over at Tanya before closing the door behind him. Following behind the recruits and "Prometheus", he let them out of his building, and lit a cigarette as he sat down on the steps.

The 'task force' had now split, as the three other agents left to tail their separate marks, but Kanoa remained on the steps for a moment, trying hard to enjoy his cigarette. This mission seemed, for whatever reason, slightly more dangerous than the ones thus far. He'd gotten to go to resorts to cause a ruckus, he'd intercepted two defecting Magma agents...but this mission seemed more dangerous.

Well...it's the first time I'm dealing with Aqua, Kanoa thought to himself, fully unaware that Jake Dressel, whom he'd encountered in the previous mission, had been an agent of Aqua.

The mission itself, in theory, was easy enough. Be a creepy stalker, then crack some skulls. What bugged Kanoa was the fact that he'd been assigned a troupe of underlings, a "task force". Though Abraham was along with him for this particular ride, he wasn't quite sure what to make of the three underlings.

"Kanoa Kaipo?"

His head snapped up at the sound of his name, dissolving his pensive moment in an instant. Before him stood a mailman, clad in what could only be described as typical Mail-man attire. (The shorts, as always, amused Kanoa to no end.)

"That's me, actually." He flipped out his ID to prove it, then signed for the surprisingly large package handed to him. Despite its size, though, it felt fairly light; Kanoa would've guessed "Top to an end table" or "sweet-ass dartboard", but those, to his understanding, were fairly heavier things.

Without waiting, he opened the package as the mailman sauntered off to do other mailman-y things. His eyes widened as he looked down at the neatly pressed collar of a the easily recognizable red garments that Magma wore. It seemed odd to be receiving a new dress uniform when his current one seemed perfectly usable.

Resting in the corner appeared to be a letter, but in a crimson red envelope, causing it to stick out ever so gently from the Magma garment. Half-suspecting a stun spore to burst out of the envelope, Kanoa gingerly ripped it open.

Upon completion of your current mission, you will no longer be my subordinate. I didn't think you had it in you, Agent Kaipo, but you've been promoted to the rank of Magma Elite. Within is your new garment, which I took the liberty of catering to a style you'd enjoy, as well as a new pokemon for your arsenal. It's one that I, personally, can't really stand, which is why I figured you'd enjoy it immensely.

It's odd to say, I'll admit, but I'm quite proud of you. You've got a lot to learn still, notably about calling people by their correct names and rank, but you've been an excellent agent thus far.

Congratulations on your promotion, Kaipo. Enjoy the gifts as a token of my esteem. As you're now on equal tier to me, there's a chance we'll be working together on missions from here on out, but I strongly recommended to the powers-that-be that we do not. Nothing personal; I just can't stand your personality.

Regards,
Donald Lennox

"Captain Porn-stache." Kanoa smiled as he crumpled the paper up, tossing it over his shoulder. He'd rather disliked Lennox, and the letter only served to cheer him up when he realized that he now met the same rank as his former commanding officer. Taking the package back up to his apartment, he pulled out his new Magma uniform.

To his surprise, it appeared to be dress uniform for...females. Kanoa's face broke into a grin as he held it up to himself: The shirt was essentially a black tube top, baring most of his 'cleavage' as well as his midriff. The pants still had the same enjoyable bagginess to them, but appeared to be lacking the itchy material that his grunt fatigues possessed. The material looked much lighter, more breathable, and most notably, had shiny gold trim all up the outseams. There also, evidently, were a pair of arm bands, which didn't make too much sense to him.

Lastly, probably to go over the fairly skimpy, almost genie-esque outfit was something Kanoa found instantly cool: A Magma Red Duster, which was the sort of garmant that immediately made him look like a badass.

"Holy balls." Kanoa remarked to Tanya, who looked at the uniform with a sort of indifference to Kanoa's new clothes. "This looks sweet as hell."

"Which Pokemon did Lennox send you?" the young girl raised an eyebrow; clearly she cared more about the pokemon that Lennox had promised, rather than the clothes Kanoa was supposed to wear occasionally.

"Let's find out. Mystery Friend, I choose you!" Kanoa raised the ball dramatically in the air before throwing it on the ground. Without much of the pomp and circumstance of opening a pokeball, this pokemon appeared rather quietly. But, once his appearanced had solified, Kanoa noticed something of a sparkle radiating off of the new pokemon for just a brief moment.

"It's a Lotad!" Kanoa grinned madly, scooping the silly faced little pokemon up off the ground. "It's a shiny one, like Benihana and Carousel."

"You got a shiny pokemon!?" Tanya seemed immediately more intrigued with Kanoa's circumstance. "It's a shiny lotad! and you have two other shiny pokemon?"

Kanoa shrugged: "Yeah. I guess this makes three."

As the two spoke, the Lotad wriggled happily in Kanoa's arms. Evidently, the little lily-pad pokemon seemed surprised at the warmth which with he was greeted. This made sense to Kanoa, seeing as Lennox was a fairly cold, distant sort of person.

"Okay shiny new friend, your name is..." Kanoa rifled through his memory, to see what skateboarding techniques could apply to this doofy-faced cutie. He recalled, for a moment, that Lotad evolved into the ridiculously bouncy sort of Ludiculo, which meant...

"Switchfoot Pogo!" Kanoa beamed. The aforementioned doofy-faced cute wrinkled his beak/mouth and squinched his face, giving him a semi-pensive, semi-constipated sort of look. "I like it, so I hope you do too." Kanoa grinned. "Why don't you stay out with me for a bit. Our first mission is to do laundry!"

He looked down at the wheeled laundry hamper that seemed perfectly suited for the mission. It was already piled high with laundry, and he felt loathe to laundromat wash his fantastic new outfit before he'd even worn it.

However, he had his old Magma Fatigues, which he had honestly felt like burning in a fire as revenge for all the itchy times he spent in them. However, he wasn't subtle enough to tail someone without eagerly giving himself away (as he learned last time when he engaged his target out of boredom).

"I got an idea, Tanya. I'm gonna lead Agent Swallow here, then you tail her back to her base when she goes to report on the location of this 'base'."

"How're you gonna do that?"

"Well, I'm pretty sure Aqua already has intel on me, and I'm sure that Swallow would follow me in hopes that I lead her to some Magma base...so I'll go to the laundromat, wash my old uniform. She'll probably tail me, so keep an eye out for her." He leaned over Tanya's seat, pulling up the dossier of Emma Luisengardt from his e-mail. "I'm trusting you not to go rooting through my e-mail. Trust me, there's a lot of porn." He grinned cheekily at her, sending her a horrible sort of wink "Like really, really nasty, kinky stuff. All guy on guy."

He paused for a moment, staring at her. "Unless you like that sort of thing, but just don't leave a mess on my-"

"Sir, I understand!" Tanya frowned, blushing. Kanoa backed off, a bit surprised at himself. He'd just probably sexually harassed a 15 year old girl.

"Hey, hey, I was just kidding" Kanoa waved his hands defensively in front of him. "Just don't go rooting through my porn stash, okay? Pull up NetballFlix or something while you wait for us to contact you."

With that, he embarassed scooped up his laundry, tossing it in a pile in the hamper. He arranged it so that his old Magma Uniform remained on top of the pile, then tucked it so that it only sort of stuck out. It seemed a bit more natural that way.

"Okay Bobby McBobcattington! Play nice!" And with that, he waved her a chipper little salute before flouncing out of his apartment once more.

Man, I can't wait to show up at Johnny's place in my new outfit.

Kanoa received a Lotad! . Kanoa levelled up to Elite!

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

Jake, Tim and Gabi stood up against a wall off to the side of a wide open space within the gym. There were kids and adults alike battling their pokemon, giving tips to each other as it went along. Being a pokemon moderator was the easiest part of their job, so they were each glad to be on this duty. Generally, pokemon trainers tend to help each other out, and there's rarely a need to step in. Good group of folk, these.

"I've tried everything," Jake sighed. He was tall, white and had a shaved head. He wore a blue sleeveless shirt. "I mean, she claims to want it, but I can't get her to come."

"Dude," Tim just shook his head. He wore a white T-shirt and had a crew cut as well as some shadow on his face. "That's not on you."

"It sort of is, though," Jake said. "You know? I mean, she's my client. It's my failure."

"Also, you don't get the commission," Gabi added with a smile.

"Yeah, there's that too, I guess," Jake agreed, though halfheartedly. It was apparent he cared for this client of which he was speaking and wanted her to take as much of an interest in her health as he did.

"Fuck it, dude," Tim said. "It's not on you. You did your job. If she isn't motivated, and you've tried to motivate her, then she just doesn't want it. You just- Hah." He raised his head at the well dressed man, about their age but clearly there on his lunch break. He was in shape and probably worked out, but he didn't much seem the pokemon type. "How'd this guy wander in here?"

"Dibs," Gabi said.

Jake and Tim just looked at each other somewhat confused, then back to Gabi. "You don't, uh," Tim began. "You don't have to- We're straight. We're not-"

"Oh," Gabi shrugged. "My bad." She kicked herself off the wall and looked back at the boys and smiled playfully, causing them both to emit a look of relief.

"Howdy," she smiled at Abraham shooting out her hand. "I'm Gabi,"

"Rick," he gripped her hand. "I don't have a, uh. I'm just here to try it out. I'm thinking about joining. I think it's great that you guys have a place to train pokemon."

"Yeah, definitely!" Gabi grinned. "So, you wanna battle?"

A chance to battle his opponent in a nonserious environment. It would have been perfect intel if not for the fact that she'd be gaining the same knowledge. It didn't make sense to ponder it, though. Rick came for a reason, and that was to battle pokemon, so Abraham had to follow suit. "You're allowed?"

"Sure, why not?" Gabi smiled. "I only have one pokemon, so pick who you wanna train, and I may or may not counter it."

Abraham smirked. "Sounds fair enough," he said, pulling out Tartarus' pokeball. He called him forth to face their opponent, who promptly summoned her pokemon, a Larvesta. That explained Firebug.

"Oo, cool," she said. "A neutral fight. This should be fun. Sol, use Flame Charge!"

"Tartarus, Thunderbolt!" He probably shouldn't have said Tartarus' name out loud, as it was a fairly key identifier, but in the heat of battle, he entirely forgot he was playing Rick. In any case, the Elekid began rotating its arms, generating electricity to launch a powerful attack. Sol, the Larvesta, was preparing for an attack similarly. Heat began emanating from within it until it was surrounded by flames. Just as it charged Tartarus, a bolt of electricity flew out of the Elekid's arms. Sol's momentum at that point was so steep that it kept going and collided with its target, bursting into flames as it did so.

"Keep going, Sol! Flame charge!" With the momentum built up, it was able to spin around and land another fiery hit on Tartarus before Abraham even got the chance to give another command.

"Tartarus, Thunderbolt again!"

The battle got real big real fast. Tartarus began rotating its arms again, but Sol already had such speed and such power that it landed even another hit. A combination of fire and electricity began hovering around Tartarus' body, and it became hard to see. Even Sol stood back, fearful of what could happen. Tartarus cried out and, when the smoke faded, there stood a taller and more muscular pokemon. It was Electabuzz, but it was still Tartarus, and it was still in the middle of combat.

"Wow!" Gabi cried out. "Looks like Tartarus just needed a little nudge. Congratulations!"

"Thanks," Abraham smiled. "I think he's taken enough of a pounding for today, though. You did good, buddy," Abraham said, approaching his pokemon. "You 'bout ready for a rest?"

"Buzz," Tartarus nodded as Abraham called him back.

"Well, again," Abraham nodded to Gabi, holding out his hand. "I really appreciate you helping me out. I'll definitely consider joining if we can battle like that more often."

"Definitely!" Gabi exclaimed. "And I still gotta see what else you're packin'. What, um. What pokemon you have. I mean."

"Yeah, that uh," Abraham nodded casually. "That sounds good."

He knew what she looked like, and he knew what pokemon she had as well as her combat strategy. That was certainly enough for now. He waved at Chelsea the receptionist on his way out and thanked her again, then walked across the street to a conveniently located coffee shop. He got a table near the window so he could see when Gabi left the gym and, of course, ordered a coffee. As he looked out the window, he couldn't help but be noticeably excited about Tartarus' evolution. He was strong before, but now he was going to be big.

[Kamaitachi]

((OOC: Somehow I missed this post that you did over a month ago. Apologies!))

With his new friend, Switchfoot Pogo, resting comfortably on his head, Kanoa made his usual stroll down to the laundromat. Except today it wasn't quite usual; he was on a mission.

The first mission since his success at an Interception, Kanoa had already forgotten/suppressed all the other extra feelings that had surged up at the end of the mission. He was off to capture some Aqua agents, who could cause some real havoc to people in Noverus. He knew that people regarded his affiliation as one with the "Bad Guys", but Lennox had so kindly explained that Magma was unwanted, but necessary. Kanoa had promptly dismissed it as some sort of propaganda babble, but it was nice to know that he was kind of playing a role in something bigger.

Then again, that thought didn't really appeal to him either.

Not wanting to get wrapped up in that headache, Kanoa brushed it all aside once more and looked up at the pair of doofy eyes above his own.

"Pogo, you okay up there?"

"Tad". The creature reaffirmed, snuggling back into Kanoa's hat. With the sight of the stupidly adorable face brought a smile back to the young man's face and a spring back into his step. The urge to whistle overcame him, so he did. The magnificently tuneless whistling floated through the air, much to the delight of no one. He arrived at the Laundromat, swinging open the door in a fairly grandiose fashion. Approaching the counter, he flipped out his wallet, ready to pay for the laundry tokens.

The girl in front of him, coincidentally, matched the dossier that he'd been given; He'd found Swallow. Then he had to force himself not to giggle at the thought of her wildly inappropriate name.

They exchanged money for tokens wordlessly, despite the fact that Kanoa was grinning madly at her, almost unable to contain himself. He coughed for a moment, tilting his head down. Switchfoot Pogo, who had been resting comfortably on his perch, fell from Kanoa's head onto the laundry hamper. With a quick squirm and struggle, the little lily-pad pokemon managed to clamber down onto the floor, but not before spilling the majority of Kanoa's Magma uniform out into the open.

Hurriedly, Kanoa rushed to pick it up and stuff it away, making himself look convincingly suspicious at the same time.

"'scuse me." Kanoa muttered softly as he pushed his cart into the laundromat. Within moments, most of his clothes had been tossed in, with all the laundry acoutriment.


* * *

With his laundry now transferred to the dryer, Kanoa was beginning to lose his mind from boredom. But then, as fate would have it, a shadow fell over him. A gulp sank into his throat as he looked up to see a fairly intimidating man dressed openly in Aqua fatigues staring down at him. Kanoa rifled through his mental file of mug shots to see if he could identify the man, but for some reason, all that could cross his mind were the dirty pictures he kept on his computer. They proved utterly useless in this situation.

"Looks like a little Magma strolled in to the wrong part of town." The man grunted, folding his arms. Kanoa did rather enjoy the Aqua uniform, as they tended to be skin tight and showed off their agents' typically excellent physiques. In this case, he wasn't overjoyed to see the bulging muscles, as it meant he'd probably be on the receiving end in the decidedly non-sexy way.

"Whatever Size-Queen" Kanoa shrugged as non-chalantly as possible. "You don't scare me."

"Oh?" The man raised an eyebrow, somehow managing to look more stern than before. "And why's that?"

"Because Switchfoot Pogo ATTACK FIERCELY!" Kanoa yelled, pointing up at the man. A bit confused, the Lotad sprang up from his resting place into a fantastic headbutt directly into the man's stomach. The burly man went flying backwards, landing with a dull thud on his behind before skidding a few feet.

"Why you..."

"Let's take this outside." Kanoa stood to his full, lanky height, which was admittedly still smaller than his opponent. The man, surprised at the sudden attempt at 'chivalry' after being sneak attacked, consented and stepped out into the street, followed by Kanoa.

"Okay Yanmega, take down that little pipsqueak!" The man stood on the sidewalk, arms crossed again to show off his biceps, which Kanoa had decided were his only nice feature.

"Size Queen!" Kanoa pointed at the man accusingly before drawing not one, but three pokeballs. "Darkslide, Benihana, Helipop! Get out there!"

"Wait, wait!" The man cried, waving his hands "Not fair!"

"Cross Poison! Headbutt! Acrobatics!" Without turning to see the effects of the attacks, Kanoa looked down happily at the Lotad at his feet. "See new friend? That's how we do it." Switchfoot Pogo wiggled appreciatively in turn, smiling doofily up at his new trainer. In the mean time, three seriously powerful attacks aimed at the lone Yanmega were being unleashed. Darkslide, Kanoa's Skorupi, scuttled forward from the burst of light and lashed out with his powerful tail, leaving a streak of poison in the air as he scored a heavy hit on the enemy. In its wake, Benihana the Sparkling Shroomish came spiralling through the poison aftertrail, feeling rather unaffected by it, then slammed his spinning headbutt into the dazed bug. As soon as the Shroomish fell away, the final attack lanced in from almost nowhere. Helipop, Kanoa's Zubat, lanced through the air almost invisibly before impacting heavily. The Yanmega fluttered heavily, alighting on the floor for a moment to shake its head before taking back off into the air.

"Mightyena! Vaporeon!"

"OOoooh, fancy pokemon!" Kanoa clapped happily, admiring the sight of the two new pokemon that had appeared on the field to even the odds. Admittedly, the Aqua man had bigger pokemon, but Kanoa had been quick to call him a Size Queen at least twice already. It didn't need repeating.

"Uh...Ancient Power on Zubat, Uh...Take Down on Shroomish and Uh...Aurora Beam on Skorupi!"

The man was already playing for type advantages; smart in a battle where he started with a disadvantage.

"Venoshock Yanmega. Giga Drain Vaporeon. Confuse Ray Mightyena." Kanoa shrugged nonchalantly once more, not bothering to use the name of his Pokemon. He didn't need to, so long as he commanded them in the same order each time.

A barrage of rocks flew through the air at Helipop, who fired off the Confuse Ray before taking the heavy hit. Simultaneously, Darkslide clacked noisily before firing off a series of glowing purple pins from his mouth that impacted the Yanmega as soon as the Ancientpower had been released. The Mightyena felt the effects of the confusion, but seemed to grow faster as a result, as the Take down hit Benihana before he had a chance to launch. With a grumpy frown, he watched as his partner, Darkslide, got hit by the flourescent beam of icy energy before draining the Vaporeon's energy. Kanoa grinned, as he was now playing to type advantages too.

As the first true round of combat died down, Kanoa watched as his pokemon lined back up in front of him. He smiled once more, scanning the enemy pokemon.

"Air Cutter! Shadow Ball! Bubblebeam!"

A slew of projectiles lanced through the air at Kanoa's team before he had the chance to issue a set of his own commands! The man had chosen wider area attacks this time, instead of focusing them down to individual targets. The man intended to sweep the field.

"Venoshock, Seed Bomb and Air Slash!" Kanoa responded quickly, before the full brunt of the attack hit his team. They launced their own projectiles in time to deflect much of the damage, but it didn't get through to the enemy team. While the resulting explosion had been excellent, and even whipped Kanoa's clothes around in a decidedly cool fashion, the smoke revealed that his team had taken damage, while Size Queen's seemed unharmed.

"Once more on Yanmega!" Shortening his command even further, as if that were the true battle, Kanoa's team responded immediately by repeating their attacks, this time all aimed at Size Queen's Yanmega. The spectacular collision of the attacks was enough to take the oversized bug out of the equation, leaving the other man with two remaining pokemon.

"C'mon, Size Queen, I can do this all day." Kanoa placed his hands akimbo, thrusting his hip in a taunting manner "You got anything better than that? I'm getting bored!"

As if to answer his question, Kanoa's own pokemon all stood rigidly at attention. Something like an electric shock snapped through the air, and both Kanoa and Size Queen looked around to see if someone else had attacked. Instead, Kanoa's three combatants all began to glow with the familiar light.

"OH balls! Not bored anymore!" Kanoa declared loudly, clasping his hands tightly as he watched not one, but three of his pokemon evolve mid battle. He had to shield his eyes for a moment from the triple intensity of the light, but once it faded, he peeked between his fingers to see a massive Drapion, a bouncing Breloom and a fierce Golbat. Size Queen was now facing pokemon bigger than his own, and the look on his face showed that he was not comfortable with this new turn of events. Kanoa waggled a finger chidingly, still wearing his smug grin: "Come on, now, Big Boy. You're not scared now are you?"

Darkslide evolves! --->
Benihana evolves! --->
Helipop evolves! --->

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

About an hour passed as Abraham, by the window, simply sat and watched the front door of the gym across the street. His attention jerked when Gabi, the woman on whom he was keeping tabs, exited the gym and started walking towards the coffee shop. Naturally, he lowered his head so she wouldn't see his face, since she knew his face.

He was waiting for her to make her order at the counter so he could walk out without her noticing, but she never did. Instead, she came straight to his table and sat down across from him. At that point, he simply smiled. "Hey."

"Thought you said you had work,"

"Yeah," he lied. "Like I said, I work near here, so I'm just taking a break."

"Oh, that's cool," she said. "I didn't know there was a Magma HQ near here."

This definitely caught him off guard. "I, um," he began. "What?"

"That's who you work for, right? Team Magma?"

"I don't remember ever saying that,"

"Well, that's all the confirmation I ever needed!" She laughed.

"How do you know?" he asked, at this point giving up the lie. She already knew, there was no point in keeping it up for the game of it.

"Are-Are you serious?" Gabi asked. "I just- I caught you. You're spying on me. No one else would do that."

"Maybe I'm just madly in love."

"Hah." She didn't really laugh. "Okay, I gotta get back to work. Have a good one, Rick."

"What?" Abraham asked.

"The fake name you gave me. Rick." Gabi said.

"Wow, fuck me," Abraham sighed. He was losing his touch.

"You'll get the hang of it one day, kid," She winked. "Oh, and if you still haven't gotten the point by now: You're compromised. Back off."

"That's not me, kid," he said with unearned confidence.

"Listen, asshole," she said, standing up. "I don't care enough about what I do to call this in. It'll look bad on me and all that. But if you don't back off, I will, and there's plenty of guys 'round these parts willin' to kill if I make enough of a fuss."

Abraham stood up and stared her down. "Make your fuss. Call it in."

"I will," she took a step forward, so her face was directly in front of his.

"Good."

"Yeah."

At that point, since they were already breathing down eachothers' throats, it just made sense that they started making out and were promptly kicked out of the coffee shop. At that point, Abraham decided to quit while he was ahead. Hopefully Kanoa was making more headway at the laundromat, so he headed there.

[Kamaitachi]

Abraham arrived on the scene just in time to watch Kanoa's newly evolved Pokemon clash with the remaining Vaporeon and Mightyena.

"Darkslide! Thunder Fang Vaporeon!"

Stepping in the way of the shimmering beam of light aimed at one of his partners, he absorbed the blow and charged forward in all his gigantic glory. Snapping his head forward, he clamped down on the Vaporeon with his pinsirs before channeling electricty into his fangs. Kanoa had not been prepared for his insect friend to know an electric attack, but it didn't hurt in the least in this situation.

"Helipop! Acrobatics! Benihana! Use...uh...an awesome fighting attack!"

Kanoa's two remaining Pokemon charged towards the Mightyena. Benihana, newly a Breloom, charged forward with a speed that surprised himself. He had been used to waddling around on tiny nub legs, after all. Now he had fully functional legs that were quite powerful. Utilizing the momentum of the charge, he swung one of his new extending arms upwards, slamming the Mightyena square on its chin and throwing it upwards into the air.

Before the poor pup could land, his Golbat Carousel slammed dead center into it from above, throwing it back towards the earth.

"Hey Prometheus!" Kanoa grinned happily as his friend walked up, waving. "I know you said to avoid combat, but this doofus thought he'd challenge me to a fight in a laundromat." He turned back to Size Queen, winking cheekily. "He's not my type, though."

"Swallow!" He yelled towards the laundromat. Within moments, a bored looking face peeked out the door. "Swallow, the target's got reinforcements. Help me out here!"

She shrugged nonchalantly.

"Dude, let them go." She brushed a dark lock of hair from her face as she adjusted her glasses. "You're outmatched."

With that, she retreated into the laundromat, which as far as she was concerned, was not of any tactical relevance to Magma, and therefore she'd be left alone.

"We'll let you go, Size Queen. Just let me get my laundry." Kanoa grinned. "But for me to do that, you just gotta concede before I wipe the floor with your punk ass."

The muscled man frowned, torn between the decision to keep fighting or to retreat. Kanoa's team's significant boost in power had made the battle much more difficult than he had anticipated; he clearly had not been expecting to face such powerful Pokemon.

"Fine." Dejected, Size Queen recalled his wounded Pokemon and turned his back to them.

"So, A-A-A-B-Ham, I found 'Swallow', and some other dude. But I didn't get anywhere." Kanoa crossed his arms. "Though, I'm willing to bet that she'll tail us back to my apartment to see where we're operating out of."

"Sirs!"

A voice crackled in on the intercom, to which Kanoa placed a hand to his ear, like he'd seen in the movies.

"Operator?"

"N-no, it's Tanya. Reporting in."

"What's up, Bobby McBobcat?"

"It's Pike. I think he got captured. I pulled up the tracking device on his earpiece-"

"They've got tracking devices installed? What the hel-"

"Agent Rascal, they're headed towards the strip mall behind the Alaka-library, which was Pike's AoE."

"Okay, we'll head over there now. Tell...uh...the other girl...to meet back up with you at base. Tell her to make sure she isn't tailed."

Kanoa folded his arms as his Pokemon sidled up to him, still out of their pokeballs. He had been about to speak to Abraham, who had hopefully heard the transmission as well, but turned to his friends instead.

"O. M. G. You guys are freaking awesome, you know that?" He took a moment to hug each one of them in turn before recalling them to their respective pokeballs before plucking the Shiny Lotad still sitting on his head.

"Well...let me get my laundry, then let's head to that Strip Mall, shall we? Maybe we can get lunch?"

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

Abraham stood off to the side as Kanoa finished off his opponent with three completely new pokemon. Helipop and Darkslide mostly just got bigger, but Benihana was an entirely new pokemon. Breloom would probably have an entirely new personality. In any case, every single one of them was badass, perhaps a little too badass for that poor Mightyena and Vaporeon.

In any case, Abraham's appearance was enough for the big guy's partner, presumably Agent Swallow, to not even bother fighting. Her lack of passion and notable pragmatism were kinda hot. Maybe he was still a little riled up from Firebug. "This is not a good direction for my mind," he sighed to himself.

Kanoa happily greeted him once Size Queen went back inside. "Hey bud," Abraham nodded. "Congrats on your evolutions. Tartarus actually evolved into Electabuzz during my thing, so that's cool."

Then, he managed to overhear the loud warnings coming from Kanoa's ear. So, Tanya thought Pike got captured and taken to the Strip Mall. And Sandy, also known as "the other girl" was evidently okay. Kanoa intelligently had Sandy return to base so that he and Abraham could rescue Pike.

Then, he suggested lunch, which Abraham knew was a joke. "Yeah, good call," he said. "Not to brag or anything, but I was definitely just at the gym, so I could definitely chow down. Legitly." Abraham's attempt at being a bro.

[Kamaitachi]

"This must be what it feels like to be in a video game." Kanoa laughed, patting Abraham on the shoulder. "All our dudes are evolving. It's like we levelled up or something, right?"

Admittedly, he had only been half-kidding about getting lunch, but nevertheless, he went in and got his laundry from the laundromat, grinning cheekily at the outed Aqua Agents as he did so. He'd include them in the report, though he was sure that they wouldn't be there once any Magma forces arrived to take them in. Still, they'd lost a base of operations on Kanoa's turf, which seemed pretty cool.

Walking alongside Abraham, and still holding his laundry. He had pulled off the battle end of his individual mission with not much of a problem, but the spying stuff seemed to be a bit more difficult. He'd blown his cover and failed to get any important information, as evidently Abraham had done too. The only one who'd succeeded in getting anywhere with the mission proper was the newbie, who'd only done so inadvertently by getting himself captured.

"A-bro-ham." Kanoa looked over at his once-again teammate. "Are you happy working in Magma? I mean, you look like one of those guys who could be successful in any venture."

He paused for a moment, his thoughts drifting to their other sometime-teammate Ares. "I mean, the more and more I think about it...we're the bad guys, right? Are you okay with that?"

The lotad on his head squirmed a little, to which Kanoa reached up and plucked him off. Settling the lilypad-like pokemon on his laundry basket, he continued to walk towards the strip mall, wishing that he'd dropped his laundry off at home first.

"I can't say I'm in Magma for any particular reason. I just joined up because...I wanted to be good at something for once. I'm getting good at Pokemon battles and all that, and I'm good at troublemaking, but that's about it." A concerned look crossed his normally jovial features. "I mean, look at these kids we're working with...they're just kids. I'm just a kid."

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

As they walked, for the first time since Abraham knew him, Kanoa got serious. And of course, he asked the question for which Abraham didn't have a good answer. He was clearly having doubts, at an odd time considering he just won a fight and seemed pretty pleased about it. Perhaps he was feeling some guilt about Pike getting caught.

"That's how these things work, Kanoa," Abraham said, looking forward as they continued to walk. "You recruit the kids. Kids are perfect, because they're strong physically, but weak and malleable mentally and emotionally. It sucks, but that's how it works. Fact is, Aqua and Rebellion are doing it too.

"You're right, though. We are the bad guys. But the thing is, we're living in a bad city. It's not like Aqua and Rebellion are 'good guys' or even any better than us. There's no good side here. It's just a fight for power, a constant struggle that won't end until the Feds step in. There are three teams, they're all the bad guys. If you're not on a team, you're powerless. Just 'cause Magna's winning, though, that doesn't make us any worse."

He paused for a second to ponder Kanoa's reasoning for joining Magma. "I mean, in my opinion, you have the best reason ever to be with Magma. And that's no reason. You arbitrarily joined this team, and you freely admit that it was an arbitrary decision. It's good, you know, since all three organizations are the exact fucking same. You wanted in on the fight, and so you picked a team. I mean, fuck it. You did what you needed to do. Or, what you wanted to do. Same thing."

And then he thought a little more, about the first question Kanoa asked him. Was Abraham happy. "To answer your first question, though. No. No, I'm not happy here. I never wanted to fight. I never even wanted to be in this town, this terrible fuckin' town. I was kinda chased here. And then I pissed off some high ranking Magma guy and here's how I'm payin' off the debt. Turns out it pays pretty well. I mean, I'm all paid off at this point, so now I'm just making money for myself. But I mean, you know. This isn't me. This isn't what I wanna do."

"You're a good guy, Kanoa. I've never really spoken this freely with anyone aside from my own mom. You're, um. I don't know, you're just. You're just a really trustworthy guy, I think."

[Kamaitachi]

The young kid nodded earnestly as he listened to Abraham. For just that moment, Kanoa felt just that: young. Abraham stopped being some 'tall-dark-sexy-mysterious' partner-in-crime, but almost an older brother figure. Kanoa had known Abraham to be intelligent in the cunning, quick-thinking sort of way. He hadn't pegged him to be a philosopher, but damn, his philosophies made great sense. Kanoa's boyfriend, Johnny, had constantly reminded him that people were much, much more than their first impressions. He had yet to fully understand that concept, even with it slapping him in the face.

"Truuuuustworthy!?" Kanoa tested the word incredulously, looking shocked at being called that of all words. "Holy Balls, dude. I don't think everyone's ever called me that." He brushed his knuckles lightly on his shirt, as if polishing them, which he then decided was an odd and somewhat douchey gesture.

"Weird though. Magma's got the money and the power, so everyone hates us. That Rebellion or whatever...they're fighting to save their city. That's the stuff out of storybooks, right? They've got some kinda crazy noble cause, which is driving us out. That kinda tips us over on the 'bad-guy' scale. Sure, no side in a war is 'good' or whatever, but we're the least good of the lot."

The thoughts concerning the matter started to jumble around in his head, and it was starting to get really uncomfortable. Kanoa wasn't much of a thinker, by trade. Shaking his head, as if to clear it, he changed topics before his brain heated up to critical levels.

"I haven't seen my parents in quite some time. They're back over in Hearthome. Rich like crazy. They probably bought themselves a clone of me, except with neater hair and more interest in school." He wistfully brushed a lock of his hair out of his face before stuffing that hand into his pocket, looking a bit sulky for a moment. "I wonder if they miss me?"

As he chatted away again, he realized that he'd gotten a step ahead of Abraham, as he often did while they walked from place to place on missions. Slowing his pace again, he nudged his partner.

"What about you? You miss your mom? Was she nice?"

As they drew closer to the strip mall, and probably after Abraham's responses, Kanoa declared: "You know what? I'm hungry after all. Do you think Hot Dogs made from Spoink give you psychic powers? Do they make hot-dogs out of Spoink?"

[Yzarc Drowsnam]

Kanoa seemed to really push the idea that the Rebellion were the good guys here, but this was something Abraham truly believed was not the case. "I can't really tell you for sure, since I've never met the leaders of the Rebellion. But look, at the end of the day, they're manipulating peoples' desire to be rid of Magma to incite war. Rebellion wants war more than Magma or Aqua. They're the only team who will always refuse to accept a peaceful resolution. I guarantee you the leaders are profiting off of this in some way.

"And either way, it doesn't matter. Rebellion aren't the good guys unless you agree with their cause. You know? You've kinda made it clear, you really don't care about the war. So, what? You're gonna defect to the Rebellion because you think their cause is more noble? Why do you give a shit about that cause, enough to risk your life to fight for them? You don't. There is no right side for you. So you pick the side who's gonna win. Magma's gonna win this war, as much as anyone can 'win' an occupation. I mean, it'll last forever, but Magma will always be ahead. You're safest here, it pays the best, and you still get to accomplish your goal of fighting and growing stronger. So stay. It just makes sense."

It was odd, defending the merits of staying with Magma in such a way. Abraham didn't care about Magma any more than he cared about the Rebllion or Aqua. But they paid him well, and if he defected, he'd have to start from the bottom. And he was definitely stuck in the city. His only other option was to bail on Hoenn, and he couldn't do that to his mother. Maybe as a last resort, but it wasn't necessary yet.

"You're parents sound, uh-" He was kinda lost. Honestly, they sounded kinda shitty, but most people would detest hearing that. Kanoa sounded like he was fishing for it, though. "They sound kinda shitty, to be honest, man. Though, I'm sure you're bringing some bias. Parents aren't usually shitty for no reason.

"My mom," Kanoa brought it up, and it made Abraham sigh. "I don't wanna get too much into it. I'm kind of a momma's boy. She loved me enough for both my parents. My dad died when I was little, so I never really got to meet him. Vague memories, but nothing real. So she really stepped up, and I love her for it. More than anything else."

He sighed. "I don't even care what pokemon they make 'em out of. Let's get some fuckin' hot dogs."

[Kamaitachi]

Kanoa nodded in slow assent, taking in everything Abraham had laid down. He was quite safe in Magma. Aside from the hijinks during the Masquerade, he hadn't done anything truly 'dangerous' to date. He had a fairly cushy pay as a grunt, which meant that as an elite, he'd probably be able to get some nice apartment somewhere with his boyfriend, Johnny.

"Right. Bias. Really, they're not shitty. I'm the shitty one. I see 'expectations' and run screaming in the opposite direction. Only reason I'm an elite now is because Captain Farty-Tarty expected me to fail."

He smiled over at Abraham as he talked about his mother, which, for some reason or another, really warmed Kanoa's heart.

"She sounds great, even if you didn't say anything about her. The fact that you love her like that means she's probably pretty awesome."

* * *

Within moments of spotting the strip mall, Kanoa managed to spot out a hot-dog stands of the most stereotypical kind. Disappointingly, the vendor proudly declared that no Spoink went into his product. That meant Kanoa would have to gain psychic abilities through some horrible head trauma. He really didn't have the time, patience or constitution for head trauma.

"Okay Brometheus." He had scarfed down his hot-dog in a few ravenous bites, washing it down delightedly with a swig of cola. Looking around the 'area of operation', he realized just how crowded the place was. His original idea of "Operation Guns Blazing" didn't seem quite so appealing with so many civilians tottering about doing strip mall-y things.

"How's the cross reference?" he asked, seemingly aloud to no one. Admittedly, he was a bit surprised when Bobcat McGork replied with:

"Complete. I pulled up a layout of the area, as well as an up-to-date map of the district. Looks like they've set up shop in the abandoned cinema."

"Neat." Kanoa grinned, tapping his ear piece. "Ingress?"

"Cinema main entrance, loading dock, back door..."

"McBobbington, always back door."

"Sir?"

"It's a joke." Kanoa thought for a moment. "But not really." He supposed he didn't really act stereotypically 'gay' enough for anyone who'd only met him that day to catch on to the joke. "But seriously. We'll use the back door."

"Oooookay..." the voice in his ear sounded quite unsure of how to go about the situation. "Sending a layout of the cinema to your Pokegear and Agent Prometheus' Pokenav."

"Wow. How did you know we had...you're good."

"Agent Rascal, computer-expert is on my dossier."

"You have a dossier?" Kanoa laughed "Didn't even read it."

Through the intercom, Kanoa could practically hear the sound of a comically large sweatdrop appearing on Tanya's head.

As he and Abraham moved around the mall to the back alley, they approached what was the loading dock for the Cinema. Though, why the cinema itself needed a full-on loading dock seemed a bit odd.

"Hey, hey Benihana" the lanky teen chanted, performing an odd little dance as he summoned his newly evolved Breloom. The mushroom-boxer in question appeared in a conspicuous spray of sparkles, standing in front of Kanoa in all of his red splendor. "Yo buddy. Wanna break down this door?"

With what he could only surmise was a sort of happy trill, the sparkling Breloom vanished from sight. The excrutiating sound of metal hinges ripping caused Kanoa's head to snap to the door, where a Mach Punch had ripped the door of its hinges. Benihana, in evolution, had grown tremendously in speed and power, which evidently surprised both of them. Making something that looked like a nonchalant shrug, Benihana looked to Kanoa for the next set of orders, wagging his tail excitedly. Even the former grouchy little personality had disappeared, and Kanoa had to admit that he missed the grimpy little mushroom man.

"I suppose...I should've said 'quietly'. But great job, big buddy!" Kanoa held out his hand in a fist bump, to which Benihana excitedly punched in return. Yelping, Kanoa reeled back as the Breloom's hand shot out, not expecting the little vestigial arms to be able to reach out in that manner. Looking quite concerned, Benihana immediately hopped over to his master's side, looking up with a sorrowful, penitent look in his eyes. "Hey, hey, it's cool." Kanoa grinned down, wincing through the pain of his hand. "You're so freaking strong, it's incredible! Let's turn that on these Aqua folks!"

"Okay Agent Double-Dukes! Let's get infiltra-" As Kanoa turned to step into the newly opened hallway, a torrential blast of water burst forth, sweeping him and Benihana clean off of their feet before neatly depositing them at the floor of the adjacent wall. In the doorway stood a sandy-brown haired man about as lanky as Kanoa. Though, while Kanoa was dressed like a hooligan, this man was very neatly put together. He wore an argyle sweater vest, a button up short, neatly pressed trouses, and wore thick, hipster glasses. Next to him, forcing them to take up the entire width of the hallway, stood a Blastoise, growling at the intruders, with water dripping from the pair of cannons on his back.

"Agent Mustard here." The man placed a hand to his ear. "I've located the intruders. They didn't get far." He turned his head to Abraham, his eyes glinting dangerously behind his glasses. "Blastoise, Flash Cannon."

The cannon-turtle turned to Abraham, growling fiercely as the barrels on his back began to glow.